Tag: Innovative

Half marathons in states stretching across the country are offering RaceJoy’s innovative live GPS tracking, from Florida to Michigan to California!

Half marathons continue to be a very popular race in the United States and appeal to runners of all fitness abilities. According to Running USA, the 13.1 is the second most popular running distance and 5Ks continue to be the most popular.

With such a high demand by runners, it’s no surprise that the majority of races available in RaceJoy this weekend are half marathons:

RaceJoy offers the most advanced form of tracking available in the running industry. With RaceJoy, participants and their supporting family and friends have access to live, real-time tracking of up to 50 participants on a map view in addition to progress updates provided at every mile on the course.

The live tracking feature utilizes the race’s official race course and notifies participants of their progress with information like pace and estimated finish time.

The GPS-based progress alerts are issued to the participants in audio format so they can get the information without looking at their phone. Spectators receive the alerts as in-app notifications. Spectators can also zoom into the interactive map to see the exact location of their runner.

Through RaceJoy, participants and spectators can also send cheers instantaneously and can send either pre-recorded cheer clips or custom Text-to-Cheer messages. Participants and fans use this feature as a way to connect and show support before, during and after the race.

If you’re interested in adding your race to RaceJoy and offering the most form of advanced runner tracking for participants and spectators, affordable pricing options are available for any race or sponsor to offer this experience. Innovative tools for race organizers are also included such as race day monitoring, tracking race operations team and a news alert system. Contact us at info@racejoy.com.

We are seeing a trend of relay races – from marathon distances to multi-day 300+ miles – requesting to load their events into RaceJoy so that they can offer live runner tracking and cheers to their participants and spectators.

RaceJoy provides interactive, real-time features to help relay teams on race day and for their supporting family and friends to encourage them along the way.

One of the most popular features available is live phone tracking, which allows users to know where team members are at any given time by watching the runner’s blue dot move on an interactive course map or the location of their support vehicle. RaceJoy uses the runner’s phone as a GPS tracker. So, it is the person’s true position, versus a simulator. Many of the relay race directors like this feature as a safety precaution – especially for the longer distances where some people could run off course.

Participants can also receive NearMe alerts to notify them when their team member(s) are drawing near to them so they can prepare for the handoff.

Another popular feature used to motivate team members is the Send-a-Cheerfeature where people can send fun pre-recorded audio cheer clips. Supporting fans can also use Text-to-Cheer for personalized messages that are delivered in audio format. This is very popular with long endurance relay events where you need an easy communication device with your runner. The text is converted into speech for the runner and they do not need to look at their phone while running.

The most recent relay to offer RaceJoy to its participants and spectators was theRelay Iowathis past weekend. This was the longest relay distance to offer RaceJoy to date: a relay course taking place across 3 days, 2 nights and 339 miles. Relay Iowa is known as the World’s Longest Relay Run!

The teams consist of up to 12 people running some of the most beautiful and challenging landscapes Iowa has to offer. The route took the runners from Sioux City all the way to Dubuque. The goal is not to win, not to come in first, but rather to work with the team to make it across Iowa in sixty hours or less.

Race organizers of the Relay Iowa offered RaceJoy to its participants and spectators for free, and more than 400 people took advantage of the interactive race day features! 144 participants had their phone’s tracked and received more than 850 cheers!

Participants are also able to get progress alerts through RaceJoy. Relay Iowa alerts were sent every 10 miles based on the GPS location of the runners’ phones. Nearly 2,700 progress alerts were sent over the course of the weekend.

These alerts are also able to be automatically posted to Facebook and Twitter in real-time.

Team members wishing to receive the alerts during relays are required to hand a phone off as they would a relay baton. With longer distance events, like the Relay Iowa, teams often choose to use a backup phone battery. After testing different portable phone chargers, our preferred brand is Anker.

Check out some of the upcoming relay’s offering RaceJoy:

Rock Lobster(free tracking)– Takes place in Bar Harbor, ME from June 24-25; Course is 200 miles

The Fred Running Relays(free tracking)– Takes place in Comstock Park, MI from August 5-6; Course options include a 200 mile relay and 100 mile relay

Peak to Brew (free tracking)– Takes place in Wilmington, NY from August 12-13; Course options include a 238 mile “full” relay and a 115 mile “half” relay

Burning River (99 cents)– Takes place in Willoughby, OH on August 6; Course options include a 100 mile, 50 mile and Back 50 mile

Relays offer a great way to achieve something with others and participate in a race you might not do on your own. There is nothing like that team spirit of accomplishing a goal together and encouraging one another along the way. It is great to see the reception from the relay race organizers and their use of RaceJoy to help build this team spirit and bring the runners together on race day! Go Get Em!

If you’d like to offer RaceJoy to your participants and spectators, you can easily get your race loaded through RaceJoy’s Website or on your race’s RunSignUp dashboard. We require a two-week minimum load time. Buyout options are also available.

This past weekend RaceJoy was available at a lot of races, but three stood out with high usage from participants and spectators. These races showed that runners, walkers and spectators alike are embracing RaceJoy’s advanced tracking and cheers, opting for a special race day experience.

RaceJoy provides an innovative race day experience with interactive features like live, real-time tracking, GPS-based progress alerts at every mile, and Send-a-Cheer.

The highest usage award this past weekend goes to Zion Half Marathon in Zion Canyon, Utah. The race organizers provided RaceJoy as a free service to participants and spectators by choosing the RaceJoy buyout option. Clearly, this was appreciated because more than 350 runners were tracked on race day and nearly 1,100 people at Zion Half used the app over the course of the weekend.

Across all three races, close to 11,370 GPS-based progress alerts were sent out! Zydeco Marathon took the lead, with more than 5,600 alerts sent. The progress alerts are sent at every mile along the course based on the GPS locations of the participants using their phones as trackers. People sent thousands of cheers over the weekend showing encouraging support to runners.

The Gate River Run was one of the first races to offer RaceJoy back in 2014. It’s exciting to see nearly 1,000 people came back to experience all that RaceJoy has to offer since first being launched to the race industry.

Thank you to all of you for embracing RaceJoy this weekend and congratulations on a great race! We enjoyed tracking you at such beautiful race courses!

You can easily add your race into RaceJoy through RaceJoy’s Website or, if you use RunSignUp, on your race’s dashboard. There is a free to the race option or an affordable buyout option for providing RaceJoy as a free service for your race. We require a two-week minimum load time, and you will need to load your electronic course map in GPX or KML format or build your own map using our Course Builder tools.

The Annapolis Running Classic, a half marathon and 10K in Maryland’s Historic Capital City, offered free advanced tracking of runners at the race this weekend through RaceJoy’s mobile app. Typically, participants and spectators pay a 99 cents upgrade fee per race for these advanced tracking features. Race organizers chose to provide RaceJoy’s GPS-based progress alerts at every mile, live tracking on a map and cheer sending as an added experience for participants and spectators.

Nearly 250 race participants chose to run with their phone using RaceJoy so that they could be live tracked on race day. And another 250 people tracked these runners on race day!

Participants followed a beautiful course with views of the waterfront city and ended at the legendary finish line party featuring live music from terrific bands and food and beverages, including the award-winning soup, oysters, Fordham Beers, Old Dominion Root Beer and Bold Rock Cider!

Supporting spectators onsite and from the convenience of their homes received RaceJoy’s GPS progress alerts and were able to watch the runners’ blue dots move along the course in a map view so that they knew exactly where their runner was while the race was on. Friends and family members sent out close to 500 motivational cheers to runners and walkers in RaceJoy. Now that is showing some classic support!

Live Tracking of Runners in RaceJoy

RaceJoy issued GPS progress alerts at every mile on the course, with a total of 15 alerts sent out per participants in the half and 8 alerts for the 10K (includes start and finish). RaceJoy issued close to 4,000 GPS progress alerts at the Annapolis Running Classic, which provided unofficial GPS performance time, including pace and estimated finish time.

GPS-based Progress Alerts in RaceJoy

We’d like to say a special thank you to the race organizers of the Annapolis Running Classic and to the participants and supporting family and friends for embracing RaceJoy! We hope you enjoyed using RaceJoy and look forward to seeing you back soon!

If you’d like to have your race loaded into RaceJoy, you can send your course map in electronic format (KML, GPX or link to MapMyRun map) to addrace@racejoy.com. Buyout options are available.